The Physical Paradox of the Runner and the Tortoise
by grey-eyed-goddess
Summary: David takes a day off of work. Nikolai is confused. (David Kostyk is the most interesting morally grey character and the most underutilized character, and I am very drunk. I'm so sorry.)


Of all the surprises Nikolai Lantsov had planned for in the years since his coronation—assassination attempts from the north, the south, and the little territory where he had banished his mother and the man he once called father; heists from Ketterdam run by a particular crew with a particular kid in charge because he didn't put it past the boy to at least try; and onslaughts of marriage proposals—he had not planned for this one.

"What do you mean he's taking a day off?" Nikolai asked Nadia. "David doesn't not work."

Nadia shrugged and pulled her old goggles back on. "He said he was taking a day off and not to bother him."

"But he's in his lab?" Nikolai rarely ventured into David's small, metal-strewn lab these days due to the schedule required of the crown. It wasn't as though David used it much anyway; he had only accepted the small room when Genya had pointed out no one could bother him if he shut the door. David had declared being part of the Triumvirate 'worth it' after that. "Right now?"

"Since last night," Nadia said. "Genya tried to coax him out, but he wouldn't even let her inside."

That was new. She was usually the only person he let near any of his experiments.

Nikolai rapped on the door to David's lab. "

The door creaked open. David, gaze to the ground, was a sliver of grey in the doorway. "I love you. Please leave. I will eat dinner. I promise."

"I love you, too, David," Nikolai said. "What's this about you taking a day off?"

"You're not Genya." But nonetheless, David threw the door open, yanked Nikolai inside, and stalked to the desk taking up the entire opposite wall of the room. He flicked his fingers at the door, locking it. "I thought you were Genya."

"I'm heartbroken." Nikolai picked up a hair-thin sheet of emerald the size of his thumbnail. "You do know that when people take a day off, they don't work?"

"I'm not working." David plucked the emerald from Nikolai's hand and cupped it as if it were breakable. Nothing was truly breakable around David. "And I know that."

"Just checking." Nikolai leaned against the wall. "I need to talk to you about—"

"I'm not doing that today," David said. "It's my day off."

Nikolai inhaled, deeply, for far longer than necessary, because he was in charge and David, theoretically, answered to him. "What are you doing?"

David's leg bounced and his fingers tapped against his thigh. The room was atrociously small, not what someone of David's position deserved but he had never seemed to mind. Now, though, Nikolai had the distinct impression that David wished he were still a young boy at a table surrounded by people too distracted to notice him working. He set down the beading plier's he had been holding and clasped his hands together. Nikolai straightened.

"David," he said. "What's going on?"

"I need your help." David picked up a small box and shoved it into Nikolai's arms. "Please."

"What is…?" Nikolai said and then laughed.

Rings—dozens, maybe hundreds, of rings rattled in the box. Golden rings so thin he could see through them. Steel rings cut like lace flowers so that flesh would be visible beneath the metal. Silver bands thick and jointed like armor. Even a few green rings Nikolai were sure were made of preserved rose stems rested in the box.

"Is your plan to save Ravka a jewelry store?" Nikolai held up a delicate glass ring with gold and silver and something that might have been rose petals spun into thread braided in the glass. "What is this?"

"I want to marry Genya," David said as if the words had been desperate to escape him for ages, "but I want to have our wedding bands made beforehand. It needs to be romantic."

Nikolai set the box on the table as if it had burned him. "What?"

He had expected Genya to be the one to broach this topic, and to his discredit, expected her to drag David, still clothed in his worn-out kefta and scribbling in his journals, to their own wedding and for David to wake up one day and mutter, "Oh, are we married?" even though they had been and he had been acting as such for years. He had been acting as such for years but that was hardly the point.

"I know that my definition of romantic is not universal, but I want the wedding to be romantic, and I want to ask her in a romantic way. Romantic to her," David said quickly. "She's done everything else. I want to make sure she knows that I'm thinking about this. And us."

"Ah." For once, David had reduced Nikolai to monosyllables and not the other way around.

"Are you familiar with the physical paradox of the runner and the tortoise?" David asked.

"You know I'm not."

"I feel like I am advancing in halves," David said, slipping from his stool and knocking it over. He didn't seem to notice. "Everyone else is slower than me but they started sooner and no matter how quickly I run, I will never catch up to them, and I need to. I want—" He sniffed and flexed his fingers again. "I want to run forever with Genya. I don't care if I never catch up with the rest of you, but I don't want to drag her down. I am _always_ behind. I want to do something right this time. "

They were hard on David, Nikolai knew; however, he had never expected this. Perhaps they had been too hard, too dismissive.

"You're definitely not dragging her down," Nikolai said quickly. He didn't know how to have this conversation. "You're just in another lane. Any of these are good enough for Genya."

They were better than most things, and Nikolai was sure many of the rings did more than simply look pretty.

"No," said David. "I want to be romantic, not good enough."

"You keep saying that," Nikolai said softly. "David, do you think she doesn't want to marry you?"

The other man paused, still for the first time since Nikolai had ever seen him, and nodded.

"She likes romantic things. She deserves romantic things." David swallowed, throat bobbing, and flexed his hands. "I'm not romantic."

"Oh." Nikolai sat on one of the three stools crowding the room. "You're not romantic to normal people, but you and Genya aren't—"

David looked up, head tilted and eyes narrowed. Nikolai cleared his throat.

"You got her a rare poison for her birthday," he said. "You are not traditionally romantic, but you're the sort of romantic she likes, so you will be fine."

Sometimes, when it was the four of them, Genya and David became so lost in their own world of metals and poisons and creating things, that Nikolai couldn't help but harbor the jealousy that had anchored in his heart after Alina left. Genya and David had a language all their own. Nikolai had only responsibilities.

"The two of you are so often so well in tune that I am unbearably envious," Nikolai whispered, but it was worth it when David grinned. Nikolai laughed. "You realize that you're important now, and important people have big weddings?"

"Yes." David smiled. "I'm getting better at parties—Genya says so—and she won't plan something long."

"No," Nikolai said. "She'll want to get you alone as soon as possible."

He joked, but Genya did have strict rules for events when David would be in attendance.

"Of course she will." David turned back to his latest ring. "Crowds are the worst."

Nikolai let that one slide.

"I was going to talk to you eventually," David said, attention back on the ring he was currently working on. "We don't have family, so you'll have to ransom her."

Nikolai held back his initial snort. "Doing that part of it, are you?"

"It's tradition." David scowled but didn't look up. "Traditions are romantic, and Genya likes romantic things."

He said it the way one might say the weather was nice or Ravka was poor or the human body contained approximately one hundred grams of salt, which he had discussed more than the weather or state of Ravka.

Nikolai set the glass ring down on the table. "Well, two members of the Grisha Triumvirate getting married demands a proper celebration. I don't think anyone will be ready for what Genya will plan. When would you like to be married by, and when do you plan on talking to her about it?"

"Not compatible," David said. "Immediately and nine days from now at 3:47 in the morning."

"Explain."

"Stargazing is romantic," David said as if reciting an equation he had only just learned. "There's a comet passing by that morning, and falling stars are romantic, too, but they're not entirely real, and I know Genya knows that, but they do present an interesting series of questions, not that it will matter to Ravka for a while, but I do wonder if we could travel higher and it would solve several issues but we would have to take into account time and gravity, which would be fun and—"

"That's more than enough," Nikolai said. "That's perfect."


End file.
